It's gonna be 3 years soon, Survival in Status Quo.

[Failure]

I'll make it as quick as possible. 

I purchased the game in early access 06.2016, but I knew about it for much longer, just wasn't sure it is what I want, that was the reason of my delayed purchase. It will soon be 3 years, and The Long Dark is nothing, but a huge disappointment, at least it didn't cost a fortune and I paid only 6.79 Euro for it [sale], way too late for a refund, but I guess for 6.79, the very first hours in the game were amazing, unfortunately... were, since in these 3 years, nothing changed. Survival is exactly the same survival it used to be, nothing new, I mean, nothing new of great importance, nothing new that would make anyone really want to replay the game, no game changing/breaking stuff being added, just details, but these detail are like painting a rust, you can mask it, but it's still there. I remember how hyped I was for the game, and it's all gone now, reading the Steam forum I come across exactly what I'm writing here, same in the negative reviews. Newbies will be happy, but after couple hours they'll be gone, because The Long Dark offers completely no real replayability. Once you did it once, it's enough. It's not MMORP to farm items, I can't really count how many times I had deja vu, doing the same thing in order, for days. What for? So I can get some achievements, and stuff like that?   

I wonder, is anything planned for Survival mode, or has this game reached its developing limits? I'm asking for something huge, a complete changer. 

I have no interest in episodes, sorry, sandbox all the way, games like that can live forever, but only with development team that knows what to do, otherwise they'll end up like a Titanic.

That's pretty much it, really. 3 years, not my first game that failed me, but at least it's still alive. 4 abandonware so far, and some more in X years development cycle. 

Quality > Quantity, the default map in the game, is also the best one, while others, are "meh" just as episodes, it would be so much better if that time was not wasted, but instead spent to work on Survival.

 

Bye. 

 

Someone reply, so I can decide if I want to keep this dead man on my list, or be done with it, really. Waiting for an update, just to see it's some 1st Aprill joke, one of many. 

Edited May 6, 2019 by Failure

[Raphael van Lierop]

8 minutes ago, Failure said:

I'll make it as quick as possible. 

I purchased the game in early access 06.2016, but I knew about it for much longer, just wasn't sure it is what I want, that was the reason of my delayed purchase. It will soon be 3 years, and The Long Dark is nothing, but a huge disappointment, at least it didn't cost a fortune and I paid only 6.79 Euro for it [sale], way too late for a refund, but I guess for 6.79, the very first hours in the game were amazing, unfortunately... were, since in these 3 years, nothing changed. Survival is exactly the same survival it used to be, nothing new, I mean, nothing new of great importance, nothing new that would make anyone really want to replay the game, no game changing/breaking stuff being added, just details, but these detail are like painting a rust, you can mask it, but it's still there. I remember how hyped I was for the game, and it's all gone now, reading the Steam forum I come across exactly what I'm writing here, same in the negative reviews. Newbies will be happy, but after couple hours they'll be gone, because The Long Dark offers completely no real replayability. Once you did it once, it's enough. It's not MMORP to farm items, I can't really count how many times I had deja vu, doing the same thing in order, for days. What for? So I can get some achievements, and stuff like that?   

I wonder, is anything planned for Survival mode, or has this game reached its developing limits? I'm asking for something huge, a complete changer. 

I have no interest in episodes, sorry, sandbox all the way, games like that can live forever, but only with development team that knows what to do, otherwise they'll end up like a Titanic.

That's pretty much it, really. 3 years, not my first game that failed me, but at least it's still alive. 4 abandonware so far, and some more in X years development cycle. 

Quality > Quantity, the default map in the game, is also the best one, while others, are "meh" just as episodes, it would be so much better if that time was not wasted, but instead spent to work on Survival.

 

Bye. 

 

Someone reply, so I can decide if I want to keep this dead man on my list, or be done with it, really. Waiting for an update, just to see it's some 1st Aprill joke, one of many. 

Question -- have you not updated the game at all in three years? Survival Mode has been updated and changed, pretty extensively, including the update that we just dropped literally TODAY. 

The better answer is that if you think the past three years of updates have amounted to "nothing", then you won't be happy with the future of The Long Dark and you're better off deleting it and moving on to a new game. If you don't like what you have right now, this is not the game for you. Move on.

[Serenity]

There is quite a bit of nonsense in that post, like all the added maps not being good. But the game really needs some end game content. You can tell that it originally wasn't meant to be played for long. Survival started as a testbed for story mode and then took on a life of its own. But even with all the additions the basic gameplay loop hasn't been touched at all.

The start of the game is awesome when you really struggle and fight for every scrap. Forging your tools, weapons and basic clothing is a nice accomplishment. On Interloper there is a nice race against the world getting colder. That's where the replayability of the game is. But then you completely stabilize and it becomes a grind. Yeah, some people have hundreds of days, but realistically there is enough content for maybe 100-150 days. And the end of that is already repetitive.

I don't really know how to combat that. Making things even scarcer and colder isn't going to change anything. I've seen some suggestions like monster blizzards a la Whiteout. Or animal migration across maps to keep you on the move. Some larger scale events to shake up the routine. Some basic base crafting options like repairs to structures or building boxes/shelves for storage would be nice too.

[ManicManiac]

@Serenity

Well, I have always felt that the sandbox is the experience your craft yourself though the way you play it... so the more it relies on player choice, the better.  The minute you force or funnel players to take certain actions outside of the core mechanics of gameplay, the more it just becomes another guided experience.  I would argue that we already have a lot of guided experiences... the various challenge modes and the story mode.  Letting the sandbox stay open and centered around player choice and player driven experiences is more valuable.  Bear in mind also that in real survival situations isolation and boredom as also threats you face... long term survival even in real life becomes centered around finding a goal to achieve each day.

Even in a 'loper run... you might find a challenge in finding out just how long you can make those supplies last... who far can you stretch those resources... can you survive a month in Hushed River Valley?  How about 3 months?  How long much of the island can you explore with just the clothes on your back and a magnifying glass?  What about if you were to carry 7 ruined raw gut in your inventory at all times? (that will make your run more interesting - promise)    There are a tone of ways to spice up the challenge for yourself.  I do it all the time, any time I get really board... then I drop all my gear and see how I long I can last with nothing but minimal clothing to prevent frost bite. 

As for the original poster: well in my opinion they just came here to spit venom... I'd rather not give them any attention for it.

Edited May 7, 2019 by ManicManiac

[Dan_]

2 hours ago, Failure said:

Newbies will be happy, but after couple hours they'll be gone, because The Long Dark offers completely no real replayability. 

My 700+ hours in TLD beg to differ. 

Maybe it's just not the type of game for you, and that's fine. I can relate to that, I bought two others copies for friends and they do not take interest in this game that is the absolute number one in my steam library.

Saying nothing relevant has changed in three years is quite a stretch but this is a free world and everybody is allowed an opinion, I disagree strongly with your progress assessment as far as updating the game goes, but then again, expectations are very much are one's own. Maybe buying a game in alpha is something you should reconsider in a future opportunity.

Cheers! 

 

Edited May 7, 2019 by Dan_

[peteloud]

".... there is enough content for maybe 100-150 days. And the end of that is already repetitive. "

After 500 game days the number of interesting challenges is reduced, but there are still many challenges out there.  I have played well over 2,000 game days, at Voyager - Stalker level, and still find fresh challenges.  At the moment I'm at day 913 on a Voyager game.  At day 900 I decided to check that I had mapped the full area of each charcoal map and found that I had a few black patches on my TWM map.  So there was a new challenge.  It is proving quite tough.  It might be tougher now with the new sprain mechanism.

This morning I have a new challenge.  My tld.exe file has disappeared, but that is more likely to be a Steam rather than Hinterland problem.  It was there a few hours ago when I tested v1.48,  now it has gone. . . . . . I have solved this problem of the lost tld.exe  Fortunately I made a copy of the v1.39 files and was able to copy over the tld.exe from that.  Just in case this happens to you I siggest that you make a copy of your tld.exe file, you'll find it under something like, "I:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\TheLongDark\tld.exe" .  I don't know why this problem arose.  I was not doing anything out of the ordinary.

 

 

Edited May 7, 2019 by peteloud

[Failure]

9 hours ago, Raphael van Lierop said:

The better answer is that if you think the past three years of updates have amounted to "nothing", then you won't be happy with the future of The Long Dark and you're better off deleting it and moving on to a new game. If you don't like what you have right now, this is not the game for you. Move on.

 

That's what I expected, thank you.

[peteloud]

Failure,

" That's what I expected, thank you. "

There is a unnecessary touch of bitchiness in your comment.   There are many games which do not suit me, so I don't play them.  I think that Raphael's comment was sensible, and not in the least rude.

[hozz1235]

Thanks for that constructive feedback on how (in your opinion) the game can be better @Failure.  Bye.

[Loonsloon]

I’ve really enjoyed the new maps. The strength of this game is artistic and existential immersion. The art direction in this game is outstanding (sound in particular). As I see it this game is not about features but feelings. The feeling of being alone on Great Bear is magical and it keeps me coming back. I love this place you’ve created. Anyway I’m obviously a big fan. I think the late late game could be tweaked (e.g. 200+days). I’d like to see complete animal extinction, shorter days until permanent night/aurora, and continuously dropping temps. Essentially, I think this game should kill you in the end. But perhaps these are things for the wish list.

[Mroz4k]

I have seen hundreds of threads where people come in to complain about the state of survival mode - and usually it is fairly simple to determine if the thread has a merit and was posted in a serious spirit by a dissapointed player, or if its written by a troll, looking in to bait the response of others for a few laughs.

This instance is the latter. If this thread was serious, there would be specifics - in "what ways" the survival did not change or why the OP dislikes it. There are none of those in here - the whole post is alarmingly vague. Next - a person who played the game since 2016 yet only joined forums 17 hours ago to complain about the "lack of content" for 3 years, when in 3 years, the amount of content in Survival at least doubled? During that time, the graphics evolved at least twice, we had updates like Faithful cartographer, Resolute Outfitter, Vigilant flame, first 2 episodes, the Redux of first two episodes and now Steadfast ranger, each bringing in major content into the game, not to mention how many different regions... Final reason - the time when this topic was posted. Literally right after the new major Survival update, there was not even enough time to check all the new content out to judge it yet... so why post this, unless the only reason was to get some reaction out of everyone.

Unless OP adds some specifics as to why, this post is there just to bait reactions. My recommendation would be to ignore it unless OP provides some details as to why they think this game didnt evolve in the past 3 years. Maybe then it would be a serious topic. 

Cant wait to see someone (my least favorite person on the forums) report this comment as backseat moderating when it clearly is just my personal opinion and everyone should do as they please... (just like all the other times, the ones I got falsely accused of and unfairly tempbanned for)

 

[Sunwolf]

This is not an MMO.  You're not on a subscription plan.  Beyond the original purchase price of the game, there have been precisely zero attempts by Hinterland to solicit additional funds from their customers.  They released a game for a set price, and you bought it.  If you weren't happy with the original game when you bought it, that's one thing, but to complain that the extensive updates throughout the months/years since you forked over your funds amount to the game not being worthwhile smacks of delusion or a deliberate attempt at trolling.

Bye Felicia.

Edited May 7, 2019 by Sunwolf

[Ape88]

OP, I beg to differ. There are tons of additions to the game including several added challenges and story mode. I still haven't explored every part of any of the maps. I still haven't explored at least one and from what I understand as the episodes come out there may be more..

I consider the game a very high value for the price I paid.

You're complaining about spending the equivalent of less than 10 US dollars on a game that was and is still in development as it was explicitly stated when you bought it in Early Access.  In fact, we get more communication on how things are progressing on these forums for the game from Hinterland than you would probably get from any big developer.

There are also many games offering far less for a much higher price.

For pespective, a 1.5 hour movie costs more than that to watch in theaters these days and then it is over. No more entertainment. And you'd spend even more if you wanted snacks.

That being said I haven't been playing much but I am one of those gamers who play a game for weeks and weeks all the time and then stop and start playing a different game for many weeks, then stop in favor of binge watching a TV show or movie series, or reading books, and then go back to playing games after weeks of not doing so.

I actually played for about an hour when I got home. Then I ended up binge watching a show.

Still fun though... Maybe if you are so tired of the game, go play another for a while or read a book about surviving the wilderness and come back to it later on.